The right touch

July 12 2002
Sydney Morning Herald

With a bit of practice Helen Bradley will have you working the keyboard like a concert pianist.

Where typing was once a skill you needed only if you planned to work in an office, nowadays it's as important as the three Rs. However, there are some things you can do to help yourself learn to touch type.

The home keys, where your index fingers rest between movements, are marked on most keyboards. Check the F and J keys for a small bump which, when you know it is there, you can find by feel (so you don't have to look down to find these keys). If your keys don't have these tabs, create your own with a grain of sand and some clear nail varnish. Clear nail varnish painted over a key face also protects characters on often-used keys from wear.

If you have trouble remembering what key is hit by which finger, colour code the keys. There are coloured key top labels you can buy (and remove when you no longer need them) or invest in a selection of nail varnishes for a more permanent solution. Use these colours as a quick visual check for the correct finger to use for each key.

If you're a dedicated hunt-and-peck typist your body will thank you for learning to touch type. Looking for the key to press requires you to bend forward and down and then you'll look back up at the screen to see the result. The constant movement causes strain in your neck, shoulders and back.

When you touch type, you maintain a healthier upright posture all the time. If you can't stop yourself looking down, place a towel over your hands and the keyboard so you can't see the keys. The towel won't inhibit your typing but it will force you to learn the key placement and sit upright as you do so. ");document.write("

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Aim to develop a light touch, so you press a key just enough to depress it but not so

much that you bang away at the keyboard stressing your fingers and hands. To reach keys above or below the home row, use your arm - not your fingers - to move the extra distance and concentrate on relaxing your arm from the shoulder to the tips of your fingers as you type.

Always practise your typing skills when you feel fresh and able to learn. There's no point trying to develop new skills after a frustrating day at work.

Practise in short bursts over a period of time, not all at once - typing is a skill that takes time and practice to develop. When you are practising, take frequent breaks, stand up and stretch your arms and shoulders and shake your hands to encourage blood circulation.

Your goal is to type the same way as you drive a car. You drive without thinking to push in the clutch before changing gears and you should, eventually, type without thinking about pressing the keys.

Reward yourself as you learn by keeping a scorecard of your progress. Remember, too, that accuracy is more important than speed, so focus on developing that first by spending most of your practice time typing slowly but accurately. Spend only about one-fifth of your time practising to improve your speed.

Just how fast is fast? Well, when you're in the range of 150 words per minute and you can keep it up for about an hour, or when your top speed is 212 words per minute, then there's an entry in The Guinness Book of Records with your name on it. But in all fairness, I need to warn you that the current record holder, Barbara Blackburn (http://sominfo.syr.edu/facstaff/dvorak/blackburn.html), doesn't use a Qwerty keyboard, preferring a Dvorak model, whose layout enhances typing speeds.

When you've put in some good typing practice and you're ready for a break, read Jared Diamond's The Curse of Qwerty at www.tks .buffalo.edu/~scomings/Sgc/dv-art.html. If nothing else, you'll know why it's taking so long to type accurately at any speed.